Astra 3B launch from Spaceport Kourou, French Guiana. Photo: SES

[Via Satellite 11-06-13] SES’ Astra 5B satellite has safely arrived at the European spaceport in Kourou, French Guyana. The spacecraft is now being processed for launch on board an Ariane 5 rocket scheduled for lift-off Dec. 6, 2013.

Astra 5B was built by EADS Astrium based on its Eurostar E3000 platform. The satellite will be located at the orbital position of 31.5 degrees east and is equipped with 40 Ku-band transponders (36 MHz equivalent) as well as six Ka-band transponders. Astra 5B will extend SES’ transponder capacity and geographical reach over Eastern European and neighboring markets for DTH, direct-to-cable and contribution feeds to digital terrestrial television networks. The spacecraft also carries a hosted L-band payload for the European Commission’s European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service (EGNOS).

Astra 5B will be the eighth Eurostar satellite in the SES fleet. It will have a launch mass of six tons, a wingspan of 40m once its solar arrays are deployed, and a spacecraft power of 13kW at the end of its 15-year design lifetime. One more Eurostar E3000 for SES (Astra 2G) is currently in final integration and tests in Astrium facilities.